The Unfortunate
by Ann Cantell
Summary: Althea hadn't died pretty and she certainly never expected to wake up again. But now she's a minor character in a book series and not quite sure what to do. One thing she's sure of though she refuses to have anything to do with the Plot. As far as she's concerned her finishing her Bucket List before her second death is her only goal. OC/SI/Self-Insert
1. Prologue

_Prologue_

 _The Girl Who Died_

I was born at 12:03 am on Sunday, September 1, 1979 at St. Mungo's Hospital in London, England. My mother said I must have been determined to come on that day because I refused to leave her a second earlier. It had been a difficult birth and at one point the Healers were sure they were going to lose me. I stayed in the hospital for weeks afterwards before I got my strength back and my mother was finally allowed to take me home. I was a very small and very quiet baby. I rarely ever cried unless I desperately needed something and even then it wasn't a very piercing drawn out cry or many crying jags for no reason.

 _I was born at 1:00 pm on November 18, 1991 at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. My mom had arrived at the hospital at 12:30 and liked to joke I'd been so impatient they almost didn't get a doctor there in time for me to be born. It had been one of the quickest births the hospital had ever had and my mom similarly recovered in no time at all. We were barely in the hospital a few days before dad took us home. I was a fat baby and during the time I didn't spend crying I was pretty friendly "chatting" with people constantly. Not that there was much time not spent crying. I think my parents barely slept those early months of my life._

My mother was named Amata and she didn't work, staying at home with me. I eventually figured out it wasn't that she didn't want to work, it was because she wasn't allowed. It was fairly hard for a Squib to get a job in the Wizarding World, especially a respectable one. My mother's family refused to let her settle for any "common" job and no one wanted a Squib for any better ones even if they didn't strictly require magic. I got the impression that mother was rather sheltered having been born, raised, taught, and lived in her family home. It was pretty obvious she rarely left and I think having me there to distract her and take up her time helped her with the idleness that seemed to bother her.

 _My mom was named Claire and she was probably one of the best lawyers in the state. She got through school with scholarships, loans, and sheer force of will. She made associate at a pretty decent firm quickly after graduating and rather than accept a partnership she, along with a few select friends, moved to help her open her own firm. She told me that building it up cost more sweat, tears, and blood than childbirth and if it wasn't for Dad being her cheerleader the entire way she didn't think she'd have been able to get through the stress. She had though and she got a reputation for ruthlessness, efficiency, and willingness to work pro bono for causes she supported. The work exhausted her, but she enjoyed it._

Amata was a rather short woman with a moon round face, narrow amber colored eyes, thin smiling lips, and long well cared for brown hair. She wasn't exactly an attractive woman, a bit on the plain side, but she took great care in how she looked and she was so lively it was hard to realize she wasn't that pretty. Her hair was shiny and cut in a way that made her face look thinner, she smiled constantly making her eyes crinkle up with a friendly warmth, and she had a well-kept and put together appearance every morning, despite never leaving the house.

 _Mom was always tall, towering over everyone including dad, and would tease us by calling us her "hobbit family". I always said she was one of the prettiest women I'd ever met. She had a face that was all angles like a knife, but lovely in its sharpness. Her hair only made the impression of a blade more profound as she'd started to go white early in life and by the time she was forty had a head of white into a short professional bob that met with her pointed chin. Her eyes were large and grey and the softest thing about her face, while her lips were oddly full and given to smiling when she wasn't in court. Mom was a bit of a slob outside of the courtroom and liked to walk around in sweat pants and comfort clothes. She has bags under her eyes from late nights that she hid expertly with makeup, but her nap schedule when off work gave away her exhaustion._

My father was not in the picture and any mention of him was shot down with a growl from my Uncle Albert and a pinched expression from Amata. Sometimes though when we were alone at night, Amata would get a faraway look in her eye and tell me about him. She talked of how he'd been alright with her being a Squib and how he could be charming when he wanted to. She told me of midnight adventures to Muggle London where both of them were a little lost, but didn't care. She told me that he made her smile and wasn't scared of Albert or his overprotectiveness. She never told me what happened to him. If her was dead or just gone, but her midnight talks were always quiet and had a bittersweet quality to them as she spoke with a smile through tears.

 _My dad was named Daniel and was the undisputed master of the house. Mom liked to joke he was half-hobbit giving evidence of his short stature, curly hair, love of food, and how comfortable he kept the house. He was the homebody in the family, working from his office to write his books. He had warm blue eyes and the moment Mom started teasing him about being a hobbit, dubbing him her "Frodo", he would tease back that he'd gone and married a giant calling her "Titaness". He was a warm man and somehow managed to wrangle all five kids into being ready each morning while making us breakfast. It was because of him that I loved fantasy books. Though his, in my biased opinion, were always the best._

I looked like my father I knew. My first time in front of a mirror I'd spent well over an hour examining my small childish face. I was a cute kid I suppose. I didn't really have well defined facial features yet due to the baby fat, but at the rate it was thinning I was fairly certain I hadn't inherited my mother's round face. I had a mess of black fluff on top of my head growing thick and wild up top. My eyes were interesting a blue filled with quite a bit of white. Gunmetal blue was a good description for them, they were striking and a sharp color. I liked them I decided quickly and remained there examining my features until Amata found me and laughed at my fascination before carrying me back off to the nursery.

 _I had my father's curl, but not his blue eyes, something that I'd always been a little disgruntled about. Instead I had soft grey eyes, a tall build, and dark brown hair with a few rebellious strands of white popping up in high school. I loved my dad's eyes though and was terribly jealous that all my siblings managed them when I didn't. Getting mom's height and premature whiteness was not a fair trade off in my book, something that I often despaired over with my oldest little sister, who laughed at my plight, but helped me dye my hair the right color to cover it._

I was an only child. I didn't even have any cousins as Uncle Albert was steadily and consistently single, something Amata teased him about in his more friendly moments. Besides Amata and Albert the only others in the house was a house-elf named Winnie who assisted Amata in caring for me and the portraits of our deceased relatives. I knew we had some more distant cousins somewhere, Albert mentioned them a few times, but I wasn't introduced to them and they never visited.

 _I was the oldest of five with three sisters and two brothers. Mallory, my oldest little sister, was only two years younger than me. After her was Alex and Angie, a set of fraternal twins in middles school who looked so a like they were practically identical. Followed by Sara, a loud seven year old who loved dinosaurs, and Henry the sweetest toddler in existence. On top of my siblings we had a ton of cousins through Dad's two sister and Mom's four brothers. Our house was never quiet and if our bunch wasn't visiting them, than they were visiting us._

I didn't like to think about how I died. In fact I went whole weeks without thinking about it. Around six months old though I started to have nightmares about it and woke up shrieking. The next few months had been tense as Amata wasn't sure what to make of the sudden change and I had finally admitted to myself that this wasn't just a dream. Those months were a dark scary thing for me filled with anger over my death, grief for my losses, and terror over what was happening to me. I didn't remember them very clearly which was probably for the best as I wasn't in the best mindsets at the time. I slowly started to recover though by the time my first birthday came around.

 _I'd only been living alone for a few months when I died. Dad insisted I call every night and my siblings usually turned the "quick" phone calls into hour long affairs regaling me on every little detail I'd missed. The night I died I'd only just finished hearing one of my youngest sister's epics when I'd heard something fall over in the kitchen. I hadn't really been fazed assuming it was just the cat acting up again. I'd walked to the kitchen listening as the phone was hand off to my brother and didn't understand at first when I saw the window open and a strange man standing there. It hadn't been my cat._

My name was Althea Runcorn and this was my second life in a completely different universe.

 _My name had been Stevie Dalton and I'd been murdered at exactly 10:13 pm July 1, 2015 at the age of twenty-three._

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 **Author's Note:** While I realize I should be working on a chapter for _The Hatake Legacy_ I couldn't help myself okay. Writing OC SI's for Naruto was fun, but then I considered Harry Potter and this happened. I blame some really good ones I read okay. Any who this is Al, she might seem a bit depressing right now, but the story should get more cheerful as it goes one. I don't have any idea where to sort her yet, but I suppose I'll figure it out as time goes on. Feel free to tell me your opinion of her and anything you want to see happen! This stories a pretty blank canvas right now!


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

Albert Runcorn would be the first to admit he didn't have much experience with children. In fact the only time he'd been willingly around children since he was one himself was when Amata was younger. Even then he hadn't really lived with her being at Hogwarts most of the year after she'd been born. By the time he'd really taken an interest in his sister she'd been about thirteen and he'd already moved out to his first flat. Living with one full time, and being partially responsible for the upbringing of said child, he found was an entirely different experience.

The first year had been a particular kind of hell when the girl had suddenly become ill out of nowhere. The Healers had been clueless to what exactly was going on, Amata had spent months in tears near constantly, Althea had barely moved and a night shrieked constantly, and a war raging around them.

But they'd managed to get through it and the illness was a distant memory, though Althea would sometimes get a distant look in her eye that reminded him eerily of those months of listlessness. Thankful it had thus far always been a passing moment after which the toddler would quickly focus back on whatever Amata was doing at the time.

This was just one of the things that stuck out about his niece. Because during those little dazed moments of hers she wore an expression much too old for any three year old. Albert would have been willing to dismiss it if it hadn't been for some other odd occurrences that surrounded her.

For instance he was certain the child knew how to read or almost certain anyway. Sometimes he would catch her with copies of his _Daily Prophet_ with an intent look on her pudgy face as she flipped through it. When she'd spotted him though she'd just smiled and pointed to the moving pictures as if fascinated by them. It had been an admirable act. When he'd picked up the paper to look at it he'd realized that she'd been reading an article about the war memorial being built at Godric's Hollow. He'd been more subtle in his watching after that purposely leaving the newspaper unattended and watching for her to get them. Sometimes she'd take the bait and the paper would vanish, but other times she'd just leave it there. It had taken him finding her reading an article focusing on Elphias Doge, which had a very distinct lack of pictures before she stopped faking. Instead she'd just looked amused at him before finishing up the article with a giggle and toddling off to find Amata. After that she didn't bother hiding her ability to read, though she still demanded his sister read to her during "storytime".

Another more obvious tell was how she talked. For the longest time she was a very quiet baby. In fact it was a big concern when her first birthday passed and she didn't speak. The Healers had come to the conclusion that she may be a bit slow. Albert was inclined to agree until he was passing the nursery after a long night of overtime only to overhear a quiet whisper inside. At first he'd assumed, a little annoyed, that the house-elf was in there talking to the child. He'd opened the door to tell the elf to leave, but only found Althea looking up at him with her striking blue eyes. It had taken a few more times to realize that what he was hearing was _Althea_ talking to herself at night. She spoke to quiet for him to hear exactly what she was saying, but occasionally heard snippets ranging from meaningless sentences such as "I miss walking." to random little songs like "Players gonna play, play, play.". Neither of which made much sense. The speech had been almost incomprehensible at first but steadily became clearer as months progressed until finally at almost two she'd spoken her first words at breakfast. A very clear "Good morning, Mummy" to an overjoyed Amata followed quickly by a slightly dismissive "And Uncle Al.". After that she still hadn't spoken overly much, but would talk to Amata whenever she started a conversation making his little sister ecstatic with her "little genius".

Even more shocking though was when he caught her reading a Rita Skeeter biography and giggling the entire way through. After she'd finished she took a quill and began correcting the books frankly terribly grammar and writing little comments in it that pointed out how sensationalized it was. Pointing out the lack of concrete evidence and reliable sources and citing. She seemed particularly fond of the book, though more in the way of mocking it than anything. It made its way into her room hidden in her dresses and when Albert unearthed it he couldn't help but snort at some of the more pointed comments questioning both Rita Skeeter's abilities as a journalist as well as her mental facilities. Albert had never forgiven the one for the scathing comment she'd made towards him in one of her articles about the Ministry, even if he hadn't been named he'd known exactly who the "overarching ambitious snake" she'd mentioned had been.

Even with his limited experience with children Albert felt he was perfectly within his rights to say his niece was abnormal. At the very least she was a sort of genius that he hadn't believed was possible. It was honestly a little frightening. He probably would have been worried for the future of the wizarding world is not for one little fact.

Althea for all her obvious, secret genius was incredibly lazy. When not entertaining her mother or doing one of her outrageous behaviors she was found napping. And not just in her room. Albert had found her everywhere a small child could fit curled up like a content cat in some cupboard or spread out across his desk face stuck to some paperwork he needed to finish. More often than not she wouldn't even bother to open her eyes when he moved her, just moving until she found a comfortable spot and continuing her nap.

Merlin help them if she ever got any ambition though. It was normally trait he would admire and encourage in his niece, but considering how much she'd managed with what looked like minimal effort he thought he'd prefer her as is. Oddness and frightening progress aside Albert found himself fond of the tiny girl in a way he rarely was with people who weren't Amata. If anything at least Althea made life interesting.

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 **Author's Note:** There's a poll up now about what house Al should be in, vote if you care to! It'll be up as long as we're in part one. Thanks for reading!


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Althea was kind of amazed how well her new "uncle" appeared to handle her oddities. At first she'd come to the decision to keep her obvious differences hidden and attempt to act like a regular child. But in all honesty that got old fairly quickly and she wasn't very good at it considering how often her uncle caught her in the act.

So she'd decided on another strategy. Not bothering to hide. After all magical folk were rather eccentric and if she grew up like this it would be less suspicious than her suddenly developing any oddities later. As she suspected Albert quickly got used to her and she slowly eased Amata into it.

Besides she doubted she would matter in the long run of things. After reading a few newspapers and figuring out her age she had a pretty good idea of when exactly she was and when she would start Hogwarts. In all honesty she'd have prefered not to have had to deal with being in the Boy-Who-Wouldn't-Die's year at all. It would have given her a better chance of avoiding all that heroics and prophecies. She comforted herself with the knowledge that she couldn't actually remember the name Runcorn so more than likely she was just nameless First Year Number 3. So long as she avoided the main players she was pretty set.

It hadn't taken Althea long to decide that messing with the Plot was not in her best interest. She was to be quite honest a rather ordinary person. She was fairly smart, she knew that much, but she wasn't a prodigy child like Hermione Granger or Albus Dumbledore. She wasn't going to flounce in save everyone, get the main character on her arm, discover she was some part creature, and lead a life of glamour and fame. To be quite frank she had absolutely no desire for any of the Golden Trio's adventure. Magic and Hogwarts would be quite enough. Fame had never appealed to her much. Well she had fantasized about being a famous author like her dad, but that had ended quickly. She liked recognition for her accomplishments as much as the next person, but she didn't need it. Also considering how much younger the main characters would be Althea was determined to wait until after Hogwarts to date with a minimum age of twenty. Otherwise it was just a little too creepy.

Her plan was to let fate run its course and interfere as little as possible. Though she did fully intend to just live and have fun this go round. Her last life had ended a little too early for her to fully enjoy last time so she fully intended to begin on her newly edited bucket list as soon as possible.

Considering how minor how family appeared to be in the grand scheme of things, her mother a Squib and her uncle pretty low-level ministry, it wasn't as if she was likely to meet anyone important anyway.

Life was nice.

. . .

"I've been promoted." Albert announced seriously over his plate of smiley face omelets.

It had taken Althea weeks to convince Winnie to make them and it had taken everything in here not to burst into triumphant applause when they'd appeared that morning. She was still smugly looking over the juxtaposition of the silly looking breakfast food with her uncle's cutting severe image when he spoke. It took her a few moments to actually register the words he'd said and by the time she did Amata was already smiling and congratulating him.

"Huh?" Althea questioned eloquently as she looked towards Albert.

He scowled a bit at the response, but didn't bother to try and scold her for being unladylike. That ship had hit its iceberg and sunk ages ago.

"I've been promoted Althea." Albert told her seriously. "I'm now the deputy of the Administrative Registration Department. Mr. Crouch recommended me for appointment while the Department was still under his management. Apparently with the transfer of leadership the recommendation was lost in all the paperwork."

The statement led to an impressively intimidating looking glare that made Althea sure Albert had _words_ with whoever had misplaced the paperwork and that the person deeply regretted it now. The next second his face cleared though and he continued just as serious.

"It's gone through now though. Madame Bones herself apologized for the inconvenience. Considering the rumors going around though the Head of the Department will be retiring in the next few years or so. He mentioned something about wanting to be with his grandchildren. As long as he likes my work and thinks I'm trustworthy it's a good step to becoming his successor."

"And you have to have headed a subdivision to be in the running for a Department Head!" Amata chimed in face blossoming into an unrestrained sort of joy and realization. She actually clapped a little. "Oh, Albert that's wonderful! Mother and Father would be so proud!"

Uncle Albert smiled at that transforming himself into something a little less fierce despite his thick black beard and impressive height.

"Exactly."

Albert looked ready to start plotting his takeover immediately, while Amata just sat there beaming look a proud mom.

Althea was distracted by another matter. Crouch. As in Crouch Senior? Her uncle was close enough to Crouch Senior to get a personal recommendation in the middle of the war? The man was not only a character who had always rubbed her the wrong way, but he'd never even learned Percy's name. What in the world had Albert done to not only be remembered but actually praised? Had he sold his soul, made a deal with a demon?

Althea quietly crossed herself, eyeing her uncle warily. She'd known he was ambitious and she also realized this was a pretty big deal. To put it plainly Uncle Albert was rather young. Only about twenty-eight or nine. Close to what Althea would have been had she lived, though mentally she still only felt an odd mixture of twenty-three and actually three. Considering wizards and witches tended to have longer lives than their non-magical counterparts he was considerably young to be in line to be the Head of anything.

Clearly Albert was a bit more skilled than Althea had originally thought. Had he not gone on to be someone important? Is that why she'd never heard of him? Or was he just not mentioned in any of the books or later on? She had the strangest feeling that she was missing something, but shrugged it off. It's not like the Ministry had been described in depth. There wasn't any reason to suspect anything was up with this. Even if the mentions of Crouch did bother her a little. She had absolutely no desire to be near that dysfunctional family anytime soon.

"So what do you think sweetheart?" Amata's soft voice asked interrupting Althea's musings.

"Huh?"

Albert grimaced, but also looked a little defeated.

"Uncle Albert wants you to go to dinner with him." her mother explained. "But we'll need to go shopping to get you a dress, it's a very special dinner."

Althea perked up instantly at the mention of shopping despite her initial aversion to the thought of "dinner" with Uncle Albert. There was only one place she could think of for them to go buy her something new to wear. She felt the wide smile break across her face as she leaned eagerly to her mother.

"Does that mean we're going to Diagon Alley?" Althea all but screamed.

"I-Yes." Amata said looking a little thrown by the enthusiasm, which made Althea wonder if she was not supposed to know about the wizard shopping district. Surely they had to have mentioned at some point in her relatively short second life. She decided to ignore the slip as inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. She was sure she could find a book to blame the knowledge on. Instead she did her best to not literally leap out of her seat in sheer joy.

"When can we go? Tomorrow can we go tomorrow?" Althea asked breathless.

Amata looked a little thrown, wearing a slightly helpless expression, but gave a small nod.

She was going to Diagon Alley. She was going to see magic! Which admittedly Albert had done some magic around her and Winnie was fully willing to give into her greedy requests for demonstrations of elf-magic, but there seemed to be an unspoken agreement not to use too much magic around Amata if they could help. Althea saw the reasoning behind it, of course, as her new mother had been forced to grow up with the knowledge that she _couldn't_ do magic. But it had left Althea with a strong desire to see as much as she could.

 _Well there's one thing to check off my list_. She decided and mentally tried to remember the stores she knew would be there that she wanted to visit.

Across the table there was a small choking sound and Althea looked up to find Albert looking at his eggs with a perplexed, horrified expression. Althea beamed at her uncle in reply. For the first time ever her mother and uncle looked like obvious siblings wearing identical looks of helplessness.

Amata offered Albert a weak grin. "At least she's finally excited about something other than naps."

Albert shook his head and dug into his smiley face.

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 **Author's Note:** These chapters or rather short, but at least that means quick updates! Though that doesn't mean I will be updating this often usually. Reviews are nice so thank you! Also thanks to the Follow/Favs you make me smile! Remember the poll. Diagon Alley soon!


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